Pole Position

Mark Thompson/Getty ImagesBecause the world needs more hideous run-off areas.

After 13 races we've still only seen three different polesitters. Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel have five each, while Nico Rosberg has three.

No one looks likely to break their dominance. Lotus and Ferrari are the only teams anywhere near, but they don't appear to have enough qualifying speed. The other Red Bull driver, Mark Webber, is ruled out by a 10-place grid penalty.

Vettel has to be considered the favourite, and he's claimed pole at two of the last three Korean Grands Prix.

But in 2011 a rather miserable Hamilton produced a great qualifying lap to snatch pole. It was to be the only race of the year in which a Red Bull didn't start from first on the grid.

The Brit is on a poor run of qualifying form—12th and fifth in the last two races.

He'll be looking to get back on track and has always gone well at this circuit, so I'll pick him for pole.

No Singapore Repeat for Vettel

Mark Thompson/Getty Images

Sebastian Vettel's dominance in Singapore was down to a few factors. The first was the layout of the track and his driving style.

Singapore is low speed and has more corners than any other circuit on the calendar. The Red Bull has exceptional traction and rear downforce (largely due to the team's ability to utilise exhaust gasses better than anyone else), making it a perfect match for that sort of track.

He brakes into the corner, getting the car turning sharply by rotating it around the inside front wheel, and then gets on the throttle early, using the downforce created by the exhausts to stop the rear sliding too much.

On top of that, his rivals struggled. Nico Rosberg, who was probably hooked into the circuit better than anyone (bar Vettel), says he was losing at least 1.7 seconds a lap due to rubber lodged in his front wing.

And finally, Vettel also saved an extra set of supersoft tyres from qualifying. These allowed him to push that little bit harder at crucial times.

He'll still be the man to beat in Korea, but there'll be no repeat of Singapore. The gap to the rest of the field will be much smaller.

Race Winner

Mark Thompson/Getty ImagesSuch a shame there isn't a livery-design version of Adrian Newey.

Sebastian Vettel has won the last three races, and he's favourite to win here too. That's not unusual—I believe he's been the bookies' favourite for every race since the start of 2011. Maybe as far back as mid-2010.

His team made a significant performance step at a crucial stage and his rivals just don't have good enough cars to challenge him.

Lotus (normally) don't qualify well, nor do Ferrari. This means they can't utilise their stronger race pace as well as they would like.

McLaren have improved since the start of the year, but they're even further away, leaving Mercedes as probably the best-placed to challenge.

But unfortunately for fans wanting some variety, it's likely they've all but given up on 2013 and are focusing all their efforts on developing 2014's car.

So no big (or even small) performance jumps will be coming from the German squad.

Picking the favourite is boring, but Vettel should win on Sunday.

In the other race (the Korean Grand Prix without Vettel), I'll go for Lewis Hamilton.